e tea, "and we ought all to be very grateful to you
and your brother."

"Oh, it isn't me, my dear," said Miss Burge (fortunately neither Miss
Lambent nor Beatrice was at hand to hear Mrs Canninge addressed as "my
dear")--"it is all my brother. He hasn't a bit of pride in him. He
says, you know, Mrs Canninge, he first learned to read and write at
Plumton School, and it's been so useful to him that--"

"Excuse me. Miss Burge, I have not my best glasses with me, is not this
Miss--Miss--?"

"Thorne, yes, Mrs Canninge, and it's very kind of your son to bring the
poor dear in to have some tea."

Mrs Canninge looked rather curiously at Hazel Thorne, as her son
brought her into the drawing-room. If she had been plain and ordinary
looking, Mrs Canninge would have thought nothing of the incident; but
then Hazel Thorne was neither plain nor ordinary, and, what was more,
she did not seem in the slightest degree oppressed by the novelty of the
situation, but chatted quietly to her companion, who was the more
conscious of the two.

"Oh, here is my mother," he said. "Mother dear, I have brought you an
exhausted slave; pray feed and rest her, or she will be throwing off the
Plumton chains, and escaping to some place where they will treat her
better. Miss Thorne, this is my mother, Mrs Canninge."

"I am very glad to know you, Miss Thorne," said Mrs Canninge quietly;
and Hazel looked her full in the eyes before lowering her own, and
bending slightly, for there was a something in Mrs Canninge's way that
was different to her son's. George Canninge had spoken to her as if she
were his equal, while his mother had smiled, spoken kindly, and hastened
to pour out some tea; but Hazel felt and knew that it was not in the
same way as she would have spoken and acted towards one of her own set.

The shade of difference was very slight, but it was marked, and George
Canninge noted it as well, though it was lost upon little Miss Burge,
who turned to Hazel, and began to prattle away directly.

"Ah, that's right, Mr Canninge, I am glad you have brought Miss Thorne
in. She has been regularly fagged to death. I never did see any one
work so."

"Miss Thorne has been indefatigable," said the squire; "and, by-the-way,
Miss Thorne, I think your mamma is somewhere here. I'll go and find
her."

Hazel was growing cold, but this little gentlemanly attention made her
smile again as she bowed her thanks, and George Canninge was just
leaving t